Nicky Beer: Pick of the Week [ed. Terence Winch]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Marlene Dietrich Plays Her Musical Saw for the Troops, 1944

 

See how the silver snaps in a lone spot,

the sound flirting with coyotes,

castrated foghorns, distant siren.

Observe how that polished body curves

in the strategy of lights, how its voice

is like a parody of mourning,

and so even more mournful

immersed in its high-pitched joke.

Admit that some other instrument

would fail—wood-honeyed curve,

funneled brass—when what’s needed

now is a tongue with the chill of steel.

Watch how the thighs hold that music

steady, how the dust and moths draw

closer to the song, a song that’s dying

even as it hovers in the dark,

a lost mouth moaning vowels

that are too close to your name.

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Nicky Beer is a bi/queer writer, and the author of Real Phonies and Genuine Fakes (Milkweed, 2022). Her first two books, The Diminishing House (Carnegie Mellon, 2010) and The Octopus Game (Carnegie Mellon, 2015), were both winners of the Colorado Book Award for Poetry. She has received honors from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, MacDowell, the Poetry Foundation, and the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. She is an associate professor at the University of Colorado Denver, where she is a poetry editor for Copper Nickel.

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                                              Marlene Dietrich, by Luana-Beatrice Lazar, 2014.

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Comments

[Grace Cavalieri]

Beer teaches us how to write again! And to the art curator...thank you Terence for ingenuity on SUNDAYS.

[Beth Joselow]

Outstanding. I admire and enjoy the capture of history, and oddment of, as well as the fine artistry of the poem itself. Thanks for including the film.

[Terence Winch]

Thanks for the comment, Grace.

[David Lehman]

An ode to Marlene Dietrich: how wonderful! "Observe how that polished body curves / in the strategy of lights, how its voice / is like a parody of mourning,/ and so even more mournful / immersed in its high-pitched joke." Great picture of Dietrich, too.

[lally]

wow wow wow, poem, post, video, all gems leaving me wanting more!

[Eileen]

Outstanding and enjoyable. Love the poem and the wonderful artwork.

[Clarinda]

Who knew??? Another delight courtesy of the divine Marlene and the unparalleled mr winch!!

[Terence Winch]

Clarinda: thanks for the comment.

[Don Berger]

A toast to Nicky Beer's great ear! Thanks Terence--this poem's fabulous. There's observation and then there's observation!

[Dr. Earle Hitchner]

Nicky Beer's ear and eye for the music conjured in this poem are uncannily spot-on. Sounds and images blend in what can be aptly called a multi-sensual feast and feat. Through this poem I can hear what Marlene Dietrich sawed. I confess to being fascinated with Berlin-born Dietrich as an actress (Lola-Lola in THE BLUE ANGEL in 1930 to Frau Bertholt in JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG in 1961) and as a cabaret singer-turned-chanteuse (and, of course, musical saw adept). I can recall Dietrich singing "Lili Marlene" in German and “La Vie en Rose” in French. Also, the musical tours she did with the Burt Bacharach Orchestra (yes, THAT Burt Bacharach) during the late 1950s practically infuse the 2007 CD compilation MARLENE DIETRICH WITH THE BURT BACHARACH ORCHESTRA, which I recommend to Dietrich doters and Bacharach back-cataloguers. Nicky Beer's poem is a gift that keeps giving. It's superb writing by her and another superb choice by Terence Winch.

[Terence Winch]

Thanks, Earle. Great comment, as always.